Results Day and UCAS

Eldest DD is expecting A level results on 15th so this is my first experience of UCAS. She seems to think her results will go to UCAS before they are emailed to her by her school, and so she will find out if she has made her offer by checking her UCAS account. She also thinks this happens at midnight. Can anyone confirm any of this, please?

UCAS will get the results the day before as will the university. I don't think they reveal anything about the results until the 15th though. On the UCAS website it says that Scottish students (for whom results day was today) could log on to Track from around 9am to check if they have been accepted. I would assume the advice will be the same for the 15th.

It was a good 8 years ago now for me (and 5 for my sister) but both of us found out by logging into UCAS in the morning before going into school to get my results. It was about 9am and not midnight.

It was scary for me though as my place wasn't offered on there, although friends were. It turned out it was because I had ABC and needed BBB, so whilst I was "in" the ucas site hadn't updated automatically, leading to a horribly stressful morning. Worth bearing in mind!

better to know that if track hasn't updated - and it didn't last year for quite a few - it DOESNT mean her results are bad or that she hasn't got her place.

If she gets her grades she'll be fine, if not and track hasn't updated she phones them and still has a good chance of a place if it's a narrow miss.

If she has a narrow miss and they dont take her you can ask for a priority remark but you have to pay. A university may hold the place. There should be staff at school to help anyone who has a problem.

UCAS will get the results a few days before she does, so that universities can make decisions in time for results day. UCAS will then update at around 8am (not midnight!!) on the 15th, to show if people are in or not.

However, a significant proportion will find that Track still says 'conditional', which means that the uni either hasn't made a decision, or hasn't communicated their decision to UCAS. At that point, it is the moment to ring up and beg tell the uni how much you want to go.

Thanks for the wise words. We are quite concerned about a near miss. She has an offer from Birmingham and an insurance offer from Leeds Met. If it shows she has a place at Leeds Met, can she still ring and beg Birmingham for a place, while holding the Leeds Met place?

UCAS released the A level results to universities on Sunday 11th. If you meet the offer, then the place is confirmed automatically.

As soon as the grades are released, universities start going through applicants that miss their grades and deciding whether to accept them, reject them or offer an alternative course.

This process starts with the firm offers, if a place is rejected, the insurance place goes through the same system.

At my uni, we always ensure all our applicants have a decision on track before the Thursday, although other unis like to keep people hanging on (which is really annoying for us if we have a potential insurance place decision to make).

If Birmingham has rejected, there is little point ringing them unless you have new information (eg planning on appealing), as they will have already considered the application.

Whether or not we will take a student with missed grades depends on a number of factors. These include:

Number of places availableTotal UCAS points (we offer on grades, but look at total points when making missed offer decisions)Which A level has missed (so a dropped grade in chemistry is less important than a dropped grade in history for social sciences)

If your DD logs onto UCAS track from 6am on results day, she should get her confirmations.

She won't know her actual results until she goes not school but will find out if she has done enough for her firm/insurance.

If she hasn't, hopefully her sixth form tutor will contact her early in the morning (eg 7am), although the tutor won't know if she has been successful with her applications, just her grades vs her offers.

I heard that the system is less likely to crash this year because it is using iCloud technology. System is supposed to be available for schools to access from 7.30am and 8am for students, our school is open from 7.30am for this reason. Clearing will be available from midnight and the Daily Telegraph has a Clearing app to download for free. The student room link is really good and has lots of good info on it. My advice is to be prepared, prepare a folder NOW with all the paperwork you need in it and hopefully you won't need it, but if things go badly your poor DS or DD will go into meltdown and you will need to be on top of things to support them.Good luck

If it still says 'conditional', then it's worth ringing up and begging, but if it already says unsuccessful, then there's very little point in ringing, as they have already made their decision. The only exception is if they are going for a priority remark, in which case the university does need to be told.

FWIW Birmingham is reckoned to be a bit desperate for student numbers this year, seeing as they have been - advertising, both online and on billboards - normally the preserve of lower ranked unis- giving out unconditional offers to A Level students who haven't yet got their grades I suspect that a near miss will result in an offer from Birmingham, but these things are never guaranteed.

If applicants achieve ABB they have a good chance of getting a place even if they miss their grades, as they are outside of the numbers cap (so no government restrictions on numbers).

But if applicants have an offer at or above ABB and drop to BBB, this could be a problem, as they may not be able to offer a place.

Last year, many top universities could not fill their places because A level results were lower than HEFCE predicted. So students wanted places, and universities wanted students, but they couldn't take them because taking students outside of the quotas leads to heavy fines.

Instead of getting rid of this ridiculous system, they have just moved the cut-off from AAB to ABB this year, but it is still going to be a problem for many.